Friday, January 09, 2009

Stephen Fry on language

Stephen Fry has a podcast, kewl. In the latest one, he delightfully educates and waxes lyrical on the delights of language, particularly the English one.

Funny thing: when I heard that he was also railing against linguistic pedantry, I said: "hah, that's rich. I saw him on the TV show Q.I., giving a stern lecture to somebody about how it is supposed to be "there is none" and not "there are none". But then of course who is more likely to be interested in helping the world with a problem than those who themselves have suffered from that exact problem?"
And lo: it turns out that in the podcast, Fry admits he has had problems himself with excessive linguistic pedantry. And not only that, the "there is none" thing is the exact example he uses! He now proudly says "there are none". (The theory for "is", is that "none" is a contraction of "not one", and so is singular.)

I'm delighted in how he compares English to London, being a big, rich mishmash of times and styles, and in constant evolvement, so it can't be said that anything is "correct" or "incorrect". And I agree that we are better off delighting in the richness and variety, rather getting hung up on details of grammar.

I also applaud Fry for admitting in public to having issues also with "gluttony, anger, and selfishness" (me too), and saying part of his life is fighting these issues. I think recognizing our own issues and working on them despite the odds against fully winning any time soon is the mark of maturity.

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I didn't know Stephen is a super-uber-geek.
"Tribal loyalties have riven the world of personal computing since Bill Gates came late on the scene and took every IBM-compatible user with him. A triumph of business manoeuvring, a triumph of opportunism, a triumph of financial acumen, a triumph of all kinds of things except computer science or technological advancement, in the opinion of people like me at least. Every time Windows had a rebirth I would get hold of it and buy a new machine to run it on believing that they must now have got things right and finally created an operating environment that could excite, impress and enthral me. But each time their system got more ham-fisted, more insulting and more indifferent to the pleasures and interests of the consumer."

Update:
"Weird to remind ourselves yet again of just how unanimous in their scepticism the press and professional techies were about the possibility of Apple being able to make a dent in the market as an untried newcomer while now we’re already thinking of them as the big brutal bullying champion. How could the major players have left a gap in the market so wide that a complete novice in mobile telephony could so instantly shame them? Shame them in the eyes of the world, at least, if not in their own. The excuses made by the CEOs and spokesmen of BigCell for their failures remind me of publishers I have met who have tried to explain why they turned down the manuscript of J. K. Rowling’s first Harry Potter novel. ‘Ah, yes. You see it was our publishing house’s policy not to consider MSS over 40,000 words for the children’s market… nothing I could do. No point even reading it….’ ‘Ah, yes, well, you see it’s not our fault it was the networks/It was not our fault it was the manufacturers.’ Hmmmmm."
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29 comments:

Kent McManigal said...

Loved him in one of my favorite movies: "V for Vendetta"!

"People should not be afraid of their governments....."

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yeah, he met a grim end there didn't he.

Oooh, it'll be interesting to see how good Watchmen is.

Anonymous said...

Stephen Fry's tweets are humorous. Poetrous even. Two samples:

“Honestly. NZ weather make UK look stable and clement. Struggled up hill in pouring rain to find Mac shop shut. My fault for not calling x”

“All right, I admit it, I have 7 iPhones. Don't ask ... x”

Gotta follow.

Anonymous said...

Man, Stephen Fry has 42,336 Twitter followers! Even Britney Spears has only 19,200.

But there's more: Fry himself follows 31,906! The first thing that comes to mind is that he isn't reading his twitter stream at all. But that's not true, it looks like he has active discussion with his fans by means of @replies.

If the tweet company wanted a poster boy for their service, they needn't look no further than this man.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

No kidding!

The idea of following more than a handful tires me.

Anonymous said...

The guy has turned geekery into an art form:

“I bought my first 128K machine in 1984, the second Macintosh to be sold in the UK - ... (the first went to the still desperately missed Douglas Adams) and I have never had fewer than ten working Macs on the go since the late 80s.”

... and then:

“I have never seen a SmartPhone I haven’t bought”

At least he brags about his geekiness.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

That's the way to go, innit? If you are something, at least be it proudly. Like I've done with my dirty old man syndrome, I made Dirty Old Men's Association International, domai.com, and it's fun and profitable too.

Anonymous said...

Absolutely.

He has one of the funnies blogs I've come across. And it's about gadgets!

“I have owned at least one of every Communicator since the brand arrived in the shape of the 9000 in … well it must be over ten years ago because I had one when I was making the film Wilde in 1996. I remember being upbraided for having it poke out of the top of my velvet jacket in one of the courtroom scenes …”

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yeah, palmtop devices were not widespread when Wilde was alive.

Anonymous said...

At least he brags about his geekiness.

He's a homosexual. In the Bible belt, they connect this to geekery. Fear technology, people! It will turn you gay! ha ha ha

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

I had a guy fix my boiler this week. He had a Blackberry Storm. I mentioned that Fry (like many others) says it's crap. The guy seemed to get a little insulted and said after a lot of stuttering that Fry "should be the last person to talk about somebody" or words to that effect. It didn't make a lot of sense. I felt that it must have been Fry's sexual orientation he is upset about, what else could it be? But I chickened out of asking him.

Timo Lehtinen said...

He must have meant that a gay Oscar Wilde impostor can't possibly be any kind of authority on small computers.

But if I was a plumber and went to fix someone's boiler and the owner then commented on my choice of smart phone because "Stephen Fry said so" ... I would probably add 50% to the bill. ;-)

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

He didn't need to, paid a fortune for a 2-minute weekend visit which just told me he didn't have the parts.

Nicola said...

Fry's three bestest tweets :)

http://twitter.com/stephenfry/statuses/1044020863

http://twitter.com/stephenfry/statuses/1044026640

http://twitter.com/stephenfry/statuses/1044024023

Alex said...

Hmm, I wonder if any "Saturday Night Fry" is available on iTunes, or elsewhere. I'll have to check out the BBC catalogue, they seem to have slowed on putting radio shows onto tape/CD.

FYI Saturday Night Fry was Fry, Laurie and Thompson, with other guests, circa 1990, top notch Saturday Night 11pm Radio 4 humour, that and "The Lander Reports", radio precursor of "This Is David Lander".

Timo Lehtinen said...

Haha, Nicola. He sounds almost aggressive on those.

After Eolake ended his tweeting experiment, I thought who else I could follow and picked Stephen Fry. Now I am hooked to his peculiar remarks and linquistic elasticity. Here's one of his:

“Good lord. I'm 38,000 ft up & tweeting. Internet on American Airlines. Bless my soul. Well, well. Goodness. Tch! Fancy. Who'd a thought? x”

And then one minute later ...

“Wonder what the maximum height ever tweeted from might be”

I myself will be tweeting here, but don't expect a high frequency of updates, at least to begin with.

Nicola said...

ttl I like those too :)

Also liked Eolake's 'Picking my teeth' tweet.

As well as Stephen Fry I also have Richard Branson, Bjork and 10 Downing Street following me now, which is possibly not a good thing...

When you do tweet I'll be listening :)

Timo Lehtinen said...

As well as Stephen Fry I also have Richard Branson, Bjork

Wow, you are famous. :-) And experienced in this tweeting business, I note. Me and Eo are still learning the ropes.

and 10 Downing Street following me now, which is possibly not a good thing...

You are right. ;-)

Nicola said...

Not so much experienced as an indication of the lengths to which I will go to avoid work.

And yes, I think I will block Downing Street, just to be on the safe side.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Surely you jest. No gov agent would call himself that.

Are you really followed by Bjork and Fry?!

Nicola said...

No it's true, Downing Street tweets about the PM's engagements.

http://twitter.com/DowningStreet

And yes, Fry, Bjork, Branson and Deepak Chopra all witness my drivel.

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Kool.

Well, Keep 10DS, but just don't tweet about your tax return. :-)

Nicola said...

Good advice :)

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Other topics to be weary of:

* Deviant sexual practices.

* Plots against government members.

* Details of drug use.

* Passwords to bank accounts.

Nicola said...

Oh dear, I think it may be too late for all of those, except the bank passwords, I'm not THAT stupid ;)

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Aha, the plot against Mr. Brown, involving a heroin-laced anal dildo, that was you?! Well done.

Nicola said...

Yeah but it didn't work did it?

Forgot to include the explosives, doh...

Eolake Stobblehouse said...

Yeah, but I do hear he's since then been seen to frequent "that kind" of bars... so maybe there's a scandal down the line.

Nicola said...

Good to know my efforts weren't wasted then :)